Sobs and Slugs
by Franklet
Summary: When Lily Evans imagined James Potter sweeping her off her feet, it had always involved him snogging her senseless. Instead, she finds herself sitting in a muddy puddle, shoeless and throwing up slugs. Where did it go wrong? L/J Oneshot


When Lily imagined telling James that she fancied him she had never been covered in mud or had been throwing up slugs. In fact, when Lily had imagined telling James she fancied him, she had been dressed in something sexy but not too sexy, her hair had finally listened to her and fanned out just like Farah Fawcett's and she had shoes on. She always thought she would say something witty and put her hand on his arm just so and he would stare at her, bedazzled by her perfection. Then he would sweep her off her feet and snog the life out of her before declaring his undying love for her to the world.

Nowhere in the millions of fantasies she'd had about this very moment had she been sitting in a puddle of muddy water, crying and throwing up endless amounts of slimy slugs.

"This," she gasped out between sobs and slugs, "is the worst day in the entire universe."

James stood over her, struggling to keep a straight face. "Lily are you sure you're alright?"

Lily managed to glare rather impressively despite the fact that she was retching, sniffling and covered in water. Not to mention shoeless. "Oh yes James," she wiped at her eyes and left a large streak of mud on her cheek, "I'm –"she spasmed and more slugs spewed out of her mouth. She gave up on talking and pointed at the wriggling slugs, a mute testimony to how great she was. As she watched they disappeared and she wished bitterly they'd just disappear out of her...well wherever they were coming from.

A strange choking sound was coming from James' direction and for a split second Lily thought he was dying. Her gaze flew to his face in a panic. How was she going to save his life if she couldn't stop chucking up slugs? And when she was shoeless? You just can't save a person's life if you're shoeless. Luckily for Lily, there was no need to figure out a way to save James' life despite being shoeless as he wasn't choking to death but was actually struggling not to laugh.

"I'm glad you find this amusing." She gagged and several more slugs popped out.

"I think it's wearing off." James pointed out helpfully. He grinned brightly in response to her murderous glare.

Lily sniffed and wiped at her eyes again, leaving a second streak of mud on her cheek. James was right – the rate of slugs being expelled from her mouth had indeed slowed down. If I was having a baby this would be a bad sign she thought wildly and snorted.

"Are you sure you're all right?" James was still smiling but she saw the concern in his eyes.

And too right he should be concerned she grumbled to herself, he's the one that did this to me. Well, she admitted, wiggling her bare toes, I did take my shoes off myself. She opened her mouth to answer and one solitary slug fell out instead. She glared at it balefully as James doubled over in laughter.

"I think that was the last one. At least, it better be," she muttered under her breath and sighed. "Help me up?" she held out her hand to James and he hauled her up, still laughing.

"Why did you sneak up on me like that anyway?" he let go of her hand and Lily resisted the urge to sigh in disappointment, "I could have done some serious damage to you!"

Lily raised her eyebrows. "I'm covered in mud, I'm shoeless and I've been burping up slugs for the past fifteen minutes."

"So a normal day in the life of Lily Evans then?" James answered with a cheeky grin and she giggled despite herself. His grin widened at her laughter and his hand flew to the back of his hair.

"Stop it," she chided, pulling his hand away, "you're already too bleeding good looking; you don't need to mess up your hair."

James' eyes widened at this and he gaped at her. Lily immediately started searching for an escape route. While she was looking for said escape route she began formulating plans to go into hiding. It was possible to stay in her dorm room forever, if she had Alice tell all her teachers that she was desperately sick. She was sure Alice would take pity on her and feed her. She was a great mate after all.

"You think I'm too bleeding good looking?" he repeated, looking a little dazed.

Lily felt herself turning bright red and she smacked her forehead with her hand. Ok, so she'd stuffed up the first part of the plan, which was to look devastatingly sexy and suave, but she could salvage the end of by not babbling inanely.

"Pretend for a moment that I'm not covered in mud and slug slime," she started to babble and something inside of her died a little. The universe was conspiring against her, she knew it, "and imagine that I'm instead devastatingly sexy and suave." James' didn't look any less dazed or confused and was starting to look at her as if she was a little mad. Which, Lily conceded, he was perfectly within his rights to do; since she herself was beginning to think she was a little mad. She looked down at her bare feet and grimaced. "Also, imagine me in shoes. Now once you've done that, erase the last fifteen minutes from your memory. Let's just pretend that I never snuck up on you and scared you witless, causing you to turn around and knock me over with your broomstick, while hexing me, making me fall into in a mud puddle and start spewing up slugs. Do you think we can do that?"

James gaped at her and blinked. "Lily..." he began, but Lily cut him off.

"Please!" she briefly considered falling to her knees in a dramatic gesture sure to force him into agreeing to anything she asked, but decided to keep at least a semblance of her dignity. "James, you don't understand, I had this all planned out for days, you were going to go down to Quidditch practice, I was going to surprise you by throwing my hands over your eyes and then say something sexy and suave about how bleeding good looking you are and how much I fancy you now and then you'd sweep me off my feet and snog me senseless. Only," her voice was rising now and Lily had a sneaking suspicion she was starting to sound hysterical. Judging by the way her arms were flailing around and the slightly wild look in James' eyes her suspicions were right, "only I kicked off my shoes back there somewhere," she flailed her arms in the vague direction of the Hogwarts castle, "because I couldn't run in them on the wet grass and then just to be bloody spiteful my bare feet didn't have enough grip either and instead of sexily and suavely draping myself over your back I rammed into it and you thought I was attacking you and you turned around and LITERALLY SWEPT ME OFF MY FEET WITH YOUR SILLY BROOMSTICK and then HEXED me for good measure! In case you were wondering, that's not what a girl wants when she asks to be swept off her feet!"

As Lily breathed heavily, tired from her rather impressive babble, and stared at her bare feet – she should really repaint her toe nails, it was beginning to chip – she heard that same strange sound from James. This time she at least knew it wasn't the sound of James choking to death and didn't start panicking.

"You ran out here in your bare feet to try to _seduce me_?" James managed to get out through his laughter.

"Laugh it up James," Lily muttered, glaring at the boy, "just keep on revelling in my humiliation and misery. Take endless amounts of joy from my failed seduction attempt. At least you can sleep peacefully with the knowledge that if a Death Eater ever did try to sneak up on you and tell them how much they fancy you, you could disarm them in a matter of moments."

"I do feel safer now," James said solemnly, winking at her. "I did always worry about my ability to defend myself in that scenario."

"Ha ha." Lily crossed her arms over her chest and sulked. This was definitely not how any of her plans went. Where was the snogging? Where were the fireworks going off in her head? Where were the declarations of love?

"You really fancy me?"

Lily's head shot up and she gaped at James. "Are you mad? Of course I fancy you! If I didn't fancy you, would I have done all this?" she waved her arms around indicating the slugs, the mud, the discarded shoes.

James cocked his head to one side, studying her. A smile was tugging at his lips and his hazel eyes were watching her very carefully. All in all, Lily was starting to feel rather uncomfortable, especially since she was bedraggled and wet. Very wet.

"You won't believe me when I say this, but I've never seen you look more beautiful. Or sexy." Lily's mouth fell open and she gaped at him. She'd done it. She'd officially driven James Potter barmy. He'd gone mad. "Yes," he said firmly, chuckling at her disbelieving expression, "even with the mud on your cheeks and your muddy legs and skirt and the slug slime all down your front."

"This isn't making me feel any better." Lily grumbled and James grinned.

He gently wiped the mud off her face with his thumb, cupping her face with his hand and her breath hitched. She couldn't take her eyes of his; they were boring into hers with such intensity. His grin was wide, dazzling, slightly bewildered and she couldn't really blame him. She was acting like a mental patient. Maybe he's humouring me because he thinks I've gone mad, Lily's brain babbled as her heart sped up.

"When you planned this out," he asked quietly, "did it end with me snogging you senseless?"

Lily nodded mutely, ability to speak, or think, or do anything except stare at James Potter gone.

"Good." It was the last thing Lily's muddled brain registered before James lowered his lips to hers and snogged her senseless. It was exactly how she had imagined it; fireworks exploded behind her eyes, her toes curled up in the soggy grass and she officially lost any and all ability to do anything else but to kiss him back for all she was worth.

He pulled back much too soon and Lily sighed, trying to tug his face back to hers. He let out a disbelieving laugh and shook his head. "No way little lady, you have some explaining to do."

Lily ignored this and frowned. "How did you know how my plan ended?" She eyed him suspiciously. Had he been spying on her?

James smiled and she swallowed. That was not an amicable smile. "I didn't. But if that wasn't how it ended, I would've made you change your mind and do it anyway."

"Oh." Lily gulped and then looked away. She peeked back shyly at James and he was still grinning brightly. "Actually, the truth is..." James quirked an eyebrow and motioned for her to continue, "the truth is, it actually ended with you declaring your undying love for me to the world in general."

James burst into laughter. He was looking at her as if he couldn't quite believe that she was real, as if she was something alien, which, Lily thought, thoroughly disgruntled, wasn't the way a girl wants to be looked at after she's been snogged.

"I LOVE LILY EVANS!" James suddenly shouted at the top of lungs, startling a fellow Gryffindor who had been making her way down the to the Quidditch pitch. She gave James the thumbs up before reminding him that he would be late to practice if he wasn't careful.

Lily was absolutely mortified and was hoping the puddle behind her would take pity on her and rise up to drag her down into its watery depths.

"How was that?" James gave her a cheeky wink.

She considered throttling him. "Mortifying." She scowled. "Maybe next time you should say it a little louder, I don't think the penguins in Antarctica heard you."

"How about I just snog you senseless again?"

And before Lily had a chance to say otherwise, James was doing just that.

_A/N: Just something cute and fluffy I wrote in an hour or so this afternoon __ I hope you guys enjoy it as much as I do :D I wish I had a James all too myself _


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